By Dave Andrusko

Montgomery County (Maryland) Attorney Marc Hansen told the Gazette newspaper yesterday that the county’s law regulating pregnancy centers will survive a court challenge, even though the law is very similar to the city of Baltimore Ordinance struck down four days earlier by U.S. District Judge Marvin J. Garbis.

Adopted a year ago, the law “was modeled after the Baltimore city legislation that [Judge Garbis] ruled Friday violated the centers' freedom of speech,” writes reporter Erin Cunningham. Pregnancy centers that do not provide abortions or do not provide referrals to abortion clinics are required to post disclaimers stating the center "does not have a licensed medical professional on staff" and the "Montgomery County Health Officer encourages women who are or may be pregnant to consult with a licensed health care provider,” according to Cunningham.

The fines under Resolution No. 16-1252 are hefty. Failure to post such signs can result in fines of more than $20,000 a month--$500 for the first day of violation and $750 for each day thereafter.

When the law was being debated, Councilwoman Duchy Trachtenberg (who sponsored the measure) “said the centers provided misinformation to pregnant women about the consequences of abortion.”

This is very similar to the justifications which the Baltimore City Council offered for its onerous Ordinance which Judge Garbis found unconstitutional. In both instances pro-life pregnancy groups (dubbed by their opponents as “limited- service pregnancy centers”) flatly denied that what they told women was untrue.

"The Baltimore case, though, is rather directly on point and should make it clear that the Montgomery County law also is unconstitutional," Casey Mattox, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, told the Baltimore Sun.

The ADF is defending Centro Tepeyac Women's Center, one of the three of the county's four pregnancy centers that are affected by the law. (The Rockville Pregnancy Center, which is a licensed medical clinic, is excluded.)

Mattox pointed out that both laws “were specifically intended to avoid imposing restrictions on abortion facilities,” a point that Judge Garbis alluded to in a footnote (www.nrlc.org/News_and_Views/Jan2011/nv013111part3.html).

Mattox told the Sun, "That's viewpoint-based discrimination.”

Pro-life pregnancy centers “are honest, do not profit from their services, treat women with dignity, and offer them real choices,” Mattox concluded. “Planned Parenthood and its pro-abortion allies make millions performing abortions on women and girls in crisis, so they are undoubtedly only too happy to see the government engage in this unfair attack.”

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